I was embarrassed to be wearing my bluetooth headset while grocery shopping. Now, had I been having a conversation with an actual person, I would have felt more comfortable. But all I was doing was listening to a podcast. Sometimes I bring my headphones with me because, in my mind, it’s socially acceptable to be wearing headphones in public. But having a bluetooth headset is geeky and lame.

A few things. First, nobody is looking at me. On Sunday afternoons it’s a couples’ shopping experience. I was in a trendy part of Chicago and it was a lot of guys pushing strollers while their wives held up scraps of paper while shelf-scanning. I saw many women in sweatpants and other “fell out of bed” gear. This is something my sister has never understood about Chicago. That women can walk around so casually without normal clothing. She lives in the West Village in NYC, however, where the most beautiful people in this country congregate.

The other piece is that even if a woman (I don’t seem to care about judgment from men) does pay attention to me, the odds she’s judging me as lame is minimal. I’ve learned that people think a lot less about (not of) me that I would have expected. Everyone has their insecurities we think are scarlet letters for the world to shame. It almost never happens. If I see an overweight woman I don’t think ugly thoughts or pity or love or whatever other judgments I might have. I just keep walking because I don’t care what she weighs. I hardly notice.

I’m sure the same is for me and my dopey bluetooth. I just kept thinking that some beautiful goddess will stop me and ask where the gourd aisle is and then I’ll quickly rip the electronic from my ear and stick it in my sweater-coat. Somehow I’ll get her approval because I’m not a geek.

I know we all have some version of this. Something we hide away to keep people from seeing us as we are.

Even though I dealt with a little embarrassment internally, I kept it in my ear during my shopping. I did take it out while at the deli counter because I didn’t want the meat cutter ladies to think I was a jerk barking orders while talking to somebody more important. Same thing when they were ringing up the totals.

There are things that screw me up a little that keeps this craziness alive and well. I was doing some work at one of our offices yesterday and a young woman walked in to do something. We chatted a bit about nothing, and as I was leaving she said, “You have great style – I like the whole ‘look’.”

This is funny because I have no ‘look.’ I wear a solid color t-shirt, jeans, and cheap Aldo shoes. I wear the same Banana Republic sweater coat everywhere I go. So, to hear that out of nowhere was flattering. Maybe she was flirting or just being nice, or maybe even lying. Who knows? Either way, it’s comments like that where I start paying attention to my looks.

What’s important is that I notice when I run those patterns of, “Uh oh – they won’t like me if they saw/knew/heard X.” That’s about me and my shame. The truth is though that some people will judge you and run away based on who you are. But, it’s been my experience that the ones who love you almost never run. And, if they do – screw ’em. They were just a big fatso with a terrible haircut anyway.

photo credit: Leonard John Matthews via photopin cc

This time last year I attended a party thrown by my friend for his girlfriend Kelly. She’s an actress and was heading off to NYC to try to do the professional acting thing. Her plan was to give it a year. I wrote about anger yesterday  and it reminded me that at that party I felt a low-level anger toward Kelly.

I wish I wasn’t typing this because she’s the nicest person in the world. I’m excited to know her and this in no way reflects anything negative about her. Okay, let’s get back to me being pissed off. I felt that what she was doing was irresponsible – who goes to NYC to make it as an actress? The odds are against her! I just found the whole thing silly and a waste of time.

I’m not proud of these judgments – but at the time that’s what was happening.

Later that night I ran into an  acquaintance. She’s a lawyer at a prestigious firm, and at this moment I can’t recall her name. So, we’ll go with Flo. She’s obviously not Flo, but that name is funny. Flo had just made partner to which I heaped praise and congratulations.

I asked Flo if she had always wanted to be an attorney, if it was her childhood dream. I assumed it was.

She laughed and told me she never had any interest in law at all. Not even though undergrad. I think Flo was an English major and didn’t know what to do after graduation. So she took the LSAT and went to law school. I told her she wasn’t giving me the whole story, and that you don’t just go to law school without having a strong interest in the field. But she kept insisting she was not really into law. Even now, it was just “okay” to her. She wasn’t complaining – she said they paid her extremely well and she was good at it.

I asked her if law wasn’t her passion, what was? All of a sudden her eyes lit up. She talked about Italian  archaeology and said that was her one true love. Now, she’s not Italian and I didn’t even know that was an actual subject. Flo started talking  excitedly  about how she’s going to go back to school, get her masters and then Ph. D. and then split her time between dig sites in Italy and teaching college students. Her plan was to quit law in ten years which would give her and her husband enough savings to allow her to pursue this dream.

Now I found myself angry with both Kelly and Flo. Here she was, an accomplished lawyer  talking about throwing her career away and pursuing this other love.

Within the next hour it dawned on me. Here were two women chasing their dreams. I was not chasing my dream. This was about me.

I live only about five blocks from the party. Though it was midnight I walked with powerful and heavy steps home. I was mad. Something had snapped, and at 35 years old, I knew I could no longer go another day without giving this writing this a real shot.

While I have never fancied myself a writer, I do know that I’m funny. Very funny. It’s my gift and I’ve studied it most of my life. I just never knew what to do with it. I had this blog, but I never updated it.

As I walked home I decided the only way to see what was there was to put my head down and do it. So, I committed to writing. A lot. Over the past year I’ve realized that being funny is only a little part of what people connect to here. I’ve added other parts of my life such as sadness, fear, vulnerability. While I’m a funny dude and social, I am also quite serious and dark.

Many time I’ve been afraid about sharing the deeper and shadowed sides of me. Thank God you guys appreciate more than just a great fart joke.

I don’t believe I’m a good writer or that my blog is important. I do think I’m funny, honest and vulnerable. It’s nice to know that there are people who relate to those qualities. I’m grateful this technology exists and that I have enough  discipline to keep going.

I thank you for your patience through this experiment. It’s odd putting your daily life out in the public domain, and I’m glad that you have shared some of your lives, too, through the comments, social media, and email.

I don’t know how to end this one so I’ll just say keep reading. Or I’ll hate you forever. And that’s a long time to be on someone’s shit-list.

There were 150 corporate sponsors, but the one everybody was talking about was Trojan?  Why?

They were giving away free vibrators to attendees.

Like any convention, there’s a ton of swag. You go from booth to booth and collect the freebies. As a man in a woman’s conference, most of the booths didn’t appeal to me. There was a panty-liner sponsor AND a heavy flow period sponsor within spitting distance (should have used a better adjective) of each other. When I saw both at the same time, I felt a little faint and sat down. I’m not kidding.

Since there were maybe a hundred guys total at BlogHer, I was treated like one of the girls. All I kept hearing about the first day was the free vibrator from Trojan. Women would tell me that I just had to go pick one up for my girlfriend. Good idea!

My girlfriend was at home in Chicago watching over my pets and redesigning my closet during BlogHer. She lives in Atlanta by the way, and drove up to do this. Visiting the Trojan booth was the least I could do for her. I didn’t even tell her about it – that way it would be seen as a present when I got home. Yes, that is how cheap I am.

I’m not uptight about these type of products and didn’t think anything about going to pick one up.

When I made it to the booth, I realized it wasn’t just a giveaway – they wanted you to hang out and watch the presentation done by a young guy who was very excited to talk about the line. He had the product  disassembled and was speaking on each attachment with increased excitement.

There are thirty women standing around watching this, and one guy – me. I had to pretend I was interested in the tongue tips and insertion attachments. I nodded my head in feigned awe when he said this increased orgasm frequency by 25% in women.

Basically, I felt like a dirty creep standing there. There was no escape as this was the deal – listen to their pitch before you get their $50 product for free. A fair trade, for sure. But to be the only guy in the crowd was uncomfortable to me. I’m sure the women didn’t even notice me, quite honestly. Their eyes were mostly glazed over.

I did make a joke at the Samsung booth where they had a new line of washer/dryers. I turned to the employee and asked if any women had jumped on top of the front-loader and gave it a spin. Sadly the person I made this joke to was a guy, and he didn’t get it.

As the presentation was winding down one of the last things the presenter said was (to my recllection), “We partnered with Kinsey and research shows the 95% of women have used sexual devices like ours at some point in their life…”

Yeah, okay, good. Whatever. Let’s wrap this up.

“…and 20% of all men have used them, too.”

Then he motions with his eyes and hands to me.

I’m directly in the middle of this crowd by the way. I have to be clear and say that it’s not like he pointed directly at me, but it felt like he tagged on the men statistic at the end for my benefit. He clearly directed his body, and the rest of the crowd, over to me..

I couldn’t exactly grab the microphone and say, “I am one of the 80%! Here me loud and true! I proclaim this on the eyes of my unborn!” All I could do was stand there like an asshole and nod as if to say, “Wow! That is very interesting! I’m totally cool with what you just said!”

That was literally the last thing he said and then his assistant started handing out the freebies. I couldn’t get mine fast enough. I deposited it in my bag and walked off.

Sadly, the only bag I had with me was an official Lorax bag – he’s one of the awful Dr. Seuss creations and was lumbering about in the orange costume handing out totes. I tossed the vibrator in, walked about twenty paces, realized how ridiculous this was, and then took a photo.

Perfectionism. She and I are both super-critical of others. No shocker that we expect just a little bit better  of ourselves at all times. What this has done is taught a self-shaming process where we are never quite happy with the way things are.

I’d like to break in to say that we’re both joyous, successful, and quite lovely people. Our lives are good.

Okay, now back to the truth. We will tear you down with mean-spirited vitriol if we catch you doing something idiotic. We make fun of you. We feel better than you.

As we talked we understood this is an inability to face our own imperfection, and since our shame is so powerful we must direct it at others. Yes, I’m looking your way. Your hair is stupid! Stupid!

We admitted that deep at heart we feel less than others. We’re the ones who are so flawed and imperfect. We’re angry at ourselves for not doing better. In short, we’re ashamed of who we are.

So, in the interest of the blog, I am about to share some of my shame.

Secrets are what bind to shame (hey, somebody grab that quote and attribute that to me!). Ahem.

I had to borrow money from my sister earlier this year.

I am totally ashamed of this. I was making a lot less money and for the first time in my life I was worried about paying the mortgage. Having to ask for money was awful because I had no compassion for my situation. I just thought of myself as a fuck-up. The truth is that I’m not, but having to admit that I didn’t save properly was painful.

So, I always pretended I was doing great financially. It was weird, too, because my mom passed down a family car (which is a luxury car) and that’s probably the only way I could have owned a car. So I now drive around in a car I could never afford.

I’m about to pay my sister back and I’m fine now, but I’m still really ashamed. I know in no way this story is unique, and plenty of people have struggled financially. That’s not what I’m talking about. I couldn’t pay my bills because I mismanaged my funds and hadn’t set a budget.

I’m so embarrassed as I feel this falls under the header of “should have known better.” And it does. BUT – I haven’t the ability to look at myself with compassion. I had a marriage end and not by my choice. I was laid off from a job where I was highly compensated and praised. I started a few unsuccessful businesses.

That’s a lot of heavy shit for a year.

But that’s my shame. I’ve never told anyone. Well, my girlfriend. And the dog. I told her too.

(Oh, and I pee in the kitchen sink. Like probably 10x a week. No joke.)

photo credit: EricGjerde via photo pin cc

Well, you know how the night before I was mad at you because I thought you weren’t paying enough attention to the television?

She remembered.  It’s hard to forget your boyfriend nearly yelling at you for keeping you eyes on your plate of food instead of up at the television.  I am so nuts I literally watched her watching the tv.  I counted twenty seconds of her staring at the plate without looking up.  For some reason this was totally unacceptable.

Please understand that I know this is nuts.  And cruel.  But yet, in that moment of anger, I can’t see past it.  Somehow what she’s doing is not only an affront to the television show, but a flat-out attack on me.  Yes, this is why I frequent a shrink.

My therapist, who rarely dresses me down, flatly said, “You can be a real shit to your girlfriend.”  Then she listed all the stuff Jessica has done for me lately.

• Drove up from Atlanta 13 hours with her dog
• Made my dinner several times
• Stayed home while I flew to NYC for BlogHer and took care of house, my dog, her dog, and my cat
• Completely rebuilt my master closet
• Bought me a dress shirt at Nordstrom’s
• Various trips alone to Target for things she thought I would like

This is what we can all agree is a good woman.  And yet I can be a shit.  It’s distancing and damaging to the relationship.

During therapy we talked about where it came from in childhood and what feelings were present.  Then my therapist said something I never thought she would say.

You have anger towards women.

I laughed at the absurdity of that idea.  I had just spent three days in NYC with five thousand women and had a great time!  Most of my readers are women.  I celebrate Women’s Day in late October.  Okay, I made that up.

But then it hit me.  I really am angry at women.

Not toward you.  And hardly any of the time does this anger manifest in real life.  But it can come out, albeit subtly and unintentionally.

As I was telling Jessica all of this I bragged about how self-aware I was and how clearly nobody she had ever dated be this adept at knowing their own psychological makeup.

Yes, you are the most self-aware man I’ve ever dated, and that’s a good thing.  However, you also act out the most of anyone in ways that make me feel dehumanized.

I’m a glass half-full guy, so I did a celebratory fist pump to the sky.  No, actually it was horribly depressing to know that I say more mean things than anyone she has dated.  Now, I’m not beating myself up here.  I’m just owning my shit.  I’m clear that 99% of the time I am a compassionate, loving, and fun person to be with.  At least my mistress says so.  Zing!

So, I am working on taking this self-awareness of crazy and trying to limit my shitty behavior.  It just takes time, sadly.

To end on a positive note, tonight I made Jessica a spicy peanut thai noodle dish from  Bon Appetit.  Then I yelled at her for clanking the fork against her teeth.  I was right to do it.

photo credit: Maccio Capatonda via photo pin cc

Why?  Because God, if he were a sea-dweller, would be a lobster.  The most delicious of all that comes from earth and water.  Let’s face it – God is pretty darned powerful.  If you were raised Christian, you already believe he’s omniscient, omnibenevolent, and omnipotent.  Basically that means that God is all powerful, all knowing, and all good.

THE SAME EXACT QUALITIES A LOBSTER EMBODIES.

But wait a second there, funny guy!  Lobsters are all knowing?  What do they know?  Well, for one they know how to be the most delicious thing on the planet.  That’s a lot of knowing in my book.  They also know how to get caught by lobster trappers.  Lastly, they know how to get broiled and mix perfectly with butter and lemon.  What else is there to know?  I submit  to you – nothing.  Sure, lobsters can’t wax poetic about  existentialism or the nature of man.  I’ll give you that.  But who needs to drone on about Nietzsche when there’s a King Maine Lobster in your possession and you have access to boiling water?  Plus, let’s face it.  Germans are weird.

Is a lobster all powerful?  Can a lobster create a boulder so heavy that even the lobster itself could not lift it?  Ugh – that just made my head hurt. You know, I don’t know a lot about religion, spirituality, or basic animal physiology.  But lobsters – they sure look strong.  Plus, I feel like if a live one came swimming over to me (I assume they swim), I would run the other way pretty fast.  Those huge antenna things are concerning and also the claws seem like they could sever my  Achilles  tendon.  That’s plenty powerful.

Is a lobster all good?  Hmm… Let’s just say, “Yes, lobsters are all good.”  Why?  Because it’s 12:13am and I haven’t slept for twenty hours.

I thought this would turn out a lot funnier.  It didn’t.

The idea of equating a lobster to God is funny.  If I wasn’t totally stuffed on lobster I could probably raise it from a 5 to an 8.

But you know what?  I don’t bat 1.000.  You are witness to a rare miss.  I’m keeping it up for posterity!

Lobster Bless You,
D.J.

photo credit: pcarpen via photo pin cc

I forgot my own birthday.  Sort-of.

Tomorrow is my birthday.  June 10th.  By the way, readers, if you want to start sending me presents, I’m more than willing to provide you with my home address.  Many may argue it’s dangerous to do this, but those many aren’t gift lovers like I.

The plan was that my mom was going to do some work in the city while my dad drove up to my place, dropped off a cake and then we would head to the restaurant.  I think my mom was going to take a cab.

Reservations were at 6:30, and my dad was supposed to be at my place by six.  This weekend there are four major festivals going on in Chicago and the city is nuts with traffic.  My folks live three hours away, so I started calling at four, just to get a read on their progress.  I called both cells, and got voicemails.

I kept calling for two hours, up until 6pm.  This was very weird, and I couldn’t figure out what was happening.  My dad was not at my place.  Nobody was answering their phones.  I started mildly freaking out, and tried my sister in NYC.  Couldn’t get her.  Called the girlfriend in ATL.  No answer.  Nobody to talk me off the ledge.

I jumped in my car, because it’s about thirty minutes to the restaurant.  Maybe I misheard and that I was supposed to drive myself there.  I was half-worried that my folks had perished in one of those carbon minoxide house-deaths or in a horrible car accident.  I’m also half-pissed because my rational mind tells me they’re fine, and that they just aren’t answering their phones.

I showed up at the restaurant, valeted the car, and hung out in the super-trendy lobby.  6:30 came and went.  I kept calling – no answer.  Finally, at 6:45pm I decided to look at the itinerary my mom emailed me.  By the way, dinner reservations do not require a TripIt itinerary.

It took forever to log-in to TripIt, which I really don’t use, but apparently my mom thinks is the cat’s meow.  And there it showed our dinner reservation for June 10th, my actual birthday.

I thought to myself, “Oh – June 10th.  That would make more sense that they’d come up on June 10th.  Because June 10th is my birthday, not June 9th.”

I cut a deal with the valet guy to only pay half.  As I got into my car he said, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

If you’re a blogger, this is a must.  Last year I went to BlogWorld LA – loved it.  Not only did I get to hear from some of the most effective bloggers online, but I met and hung out with people who were passionate about blogging – you know, nerds.  I have five close friendships today that started and blossomed there.

I’m heading in September to BlogHer, a conference in NYC that focuses on women bloggers.  I’m going because I want to spend time with other people like me (even if they have boobs – wait… especially because they have boobs!).

And in October I’ll be heading down to Atlanta to go to AimingLow’s Non-Con.  I’ve written before how AimingLow is simply one of the funniest sites on the web.  I’m also a bit partial, as I’m on their “comic relief roster” and publish regularly there.

Their Non-Con is similar to the large conferences without the big presentations.  Just blogger to blogger interaction, with a focus on small group conversation.  This is what ends up happening after-hours at the big conferences anyway.

Best of all – this conference is totally free.  That’s amazing because to go to BlogHer or BlogWorld, you’ll shell out hundreds of dollars just to get in (and even then it’s a total steal).  As far as I know, this is the first time anything of this scale has been attempted.

I’ll be speaking with two incredible ladies.  The first, Una Lamarche, is a HuffPo writer and all-around badass.  The other is Robin Plemmons, a hilarious writer and artist.  Her greeting cards are the only ones I will be buying from now on (aside from the Bieber line at American Greetings that I send out on Arbor Day).

Head over to AimingLow and sign up for information about this event.  Trust me – it’s going to be great.  And if it sucks, I’m not going to take responsibility for your poor decision.  T.S.

I have installed a timer to display the number of days, hours, and minutes since the last time my cat Pantaloons peed on the bed where I sleep.  Right on this very blog.

I know.  You just pissed yourself silly.  That white dining room chair you recently upholstered is now a golden maize from your urine.  Your husband told you that white stained easily.  You didn’t listen.  And now you have pee chair.  Oh well.  Make grandma sit there.

On the right hand side of the blog, near the bottom you’ll see the timer.  Oh yeah, everything is better with a count-up timer.  It’s like that deficit clock they used to have in NYC.  Except this actually means something.  Well, it’s something real to me.  I woke up six days ago to my cat peeing at the foot of my bed, right near my feet.  This was a dark moment in my life.  It made it into my diary.

So, six days now she has been on the cat-ear Prozac.  My ex-wife (a vet) told me to buy gloves so the Prozac doesn’t seep into my bloodstream.  I figure if she takes it, I should take it too.  Thus far she hasn’t peed.  I also am feeling nothing but pure euphoria and ecstasy with each waking moment.  Partly from the clean bed, partly from the SSRI.

If you’re not familiar with the Pantaloons bed-pee saga, just shoot over to the search box on the right and type in Pantaloons.

By the way, this is what happens when I don’t get home from band practice until very late, and realize I still hadn’t written today.  I’ll try to leave you with something humorous AND clever.  Let me think a sec…  hmm…  (five minutes have passed)

Okay, I found something.  A visual gag to tie the whole piece together.  Tomorrow when I’m rested I’ll tell a stronger tale.

I remember being in high school and over at a girl’s house I liked.  That night, The Grinch  was on television, and I pretended to be excited by saying, “Oh yes, a classic.  Can’t wait!”  We settled in and I remember thinking, “I don’t honestly think I’ve seen this before.”

I didn’t really get into it, and was kind of put off by the narrator who sounded super-creepy to me.

This reminds me – not sure if I’ve mentioned this before, but I was on a date in high school once and madly in love.  She and I went to go see Philadelphia.  I was nervous, so I drank seven Milwaukee’s Best prior to getting picked up.  Since I got up to pee three times during the film, plus I was hammered, and also that I was constantly wondering if I should make a move, I didn’t pay attention to the plot.  Near the end of the movie, I noticed everyone around me crying.  I actually whipped up fake tears and pretended to blot my eyes.  I had no idea what was going on.  Didn’t get any afterwards.

So, I’m not a Grinch fan.  Sorry.  Plus, It’s a Wonderful Life is basically a perfect movie, so I don’t really feel the need to watch anything else.

My family had structured this year’s Christmas holiday the same way we always do.  My sister comes in from NYC, I drive down from Chicago, and we start preparing.

For the past fifteen years, we’ve hosted a holiday party at our house the night of Christmas Eve.  We don’t send out invitations, and it’s basically a “come when you can” event.  People start dribbling in at around 6:30pm and leave around midnight.  We used to end the party at 10:40pm so that we could make it to the 11:00pm church service.  But several years ago, we said, “Screw it!” and now we don’t get to church.

Before judging us you have to realize that we have a lot  of cleanup to do.  Anywhere from 30-50 people funnel through this party, and we go all-out with food and drink.  It’s a lot of prep and tear-down.  We used to get home from church at 12:20am and then stay up until 2am cleaning.  And pretty much every glass and dish has to be washed by hand.  It sucks.

By eliminating the church component, we can get to bed by around 1am.

This year my sister brought her longtime boyfriend, Al.  We don’t always get to see Al because often times he works through the holidays.  I was grateful he was able to come, not only because he’s a fun, good guy, but also that he’s so proactively helpful, I don’t have to do much around the house.  He’s always asking my mom what he can do next, which allows me to waste time in the ways I love.

Al and Dana also brought their two dogs with them, both Haveneses.  Because it’s insanely expensive to fly home from NYC to Peoria in general, and then also kenneling the dogs or flying with them, they decided this year to drive.  It’s a long trip, but they made it.

The Christmas Eve party went off without a hitch.  We had a great time and the last guest didn’t hobble her way out of there until  after 1am.  It was at about 1:30am that I realized the room was spinning and I needed to sit down.  I wasn’t sure if it was just too late, or if I had consumed too many St. Pauli Girl non-alcoholic  beers (I had four).  I felt like a dick, but I announced to the family that I had to go to bed.  I was  nauseous.

I’m sure the  initial  thought from the rest was that I was just trying to get out of work – and, hey, I’m not above faking a little stomach ache to avoid drying dishes.  This time, however, I really was ill.  Not illin’ mind you.  Just ill.

Part II comes tomorrow!